Social scientists have either invented or popularized lots of cool math techniques in the past 50 or so years ... I can think of a bunch of examples Chomsky's Syntactic Structures, from 1957, Eugene Fama, James Hamilton, etc.
I haven't found the killer book or books that would introduce the gentle reader to a wide range of such techniques though. You always want to be up on the latest terms to win intellectual pissing contests:
"Apparently you didn't consider lagged cross-sectional correlation".
Don't forget that an awful lot of early work in statistical methods came from two groups: biologists studying animal populations, and sociologists studying human populations. Time after time in the days when I was trying to grok stats, I would find that the originally cited paper was in some psych of soc journal. And stats is all about useful predictive measures.
I do have two quibbles here, however. First, two equate the Uncertainty Principle with "arbitrariness and subjectivity" seems all wrong to me. I believe the Uncertainty Principle is neither arbitrary nor subjective, but rather defines a fundamental limit to what is knowable in the universe.
And second, I think it's important to point out that they use a very specific definition of corruption: "such as the misuse of public
power for private benefit, for example bribing
of public officials, kickbacks in public
procurement, or embezzlement of public
funds." Just as you point out how the Democratic Peace Theory is only demonstrable if you first understand their definition of "democracy", so too is it important to understand this definition of "corruption" before you can understand this study. For instance, some people might easily argue that it is a form of corruption to pass laws that favor a particular voting bloc at the expense of the populace as a whole, merely to gain political support. In other words, "pork" might fit many people's definition of corruption. And if you use that definition, it may be that you'll reach almost the opposite conclusion from this study: dictators do just enough pork to keep the people from starting a revolution, while democracies are rife with pork.
I think that definitions are part of what complicate any social science question, since so many of their topics of study have precise meanings to the scientists, but a wide range of varied meanings in general use. So people think they understand what the scientists are talking about, when they really don't.
It's sort of amazing how much resistance there still is to low-carb.
I've been doing a version the low-carb thing for several years now (my first and last meals of the day hav no or very low carbs). Protein Power is probably the best book on the subject. It recounts the history of the low-carb diet, which believe it or not goes all the way back to an 18th century British pamphleteer's "Letter on Corpulence."
Another interesting example from the book was a man in the 1930s who volunteered to eat nothing but caribou meat for a year, as explorers had claimed Eskimos did. The doctors monitoring him thought he would die in months. He not only survived, he actually lost weight an appeared generally healthier.
The basic premise is simple: blood sugar is toxic. The insulin your body must produce to control it is also bad for you.
I've corresponded a few times with Mike and Mary Dan Eades. Nice people. :-)
The explorer you're speaking of is Vilhjalmur Stefansson, a Harvard anthropologist who was born in Iceland and who spent many years in the arctic, where he discovered that the inuit typically went about nine months of the year eating nothing but meat and fish. He also found that he was perfectly healthy on their diet.
There's a very interesting fact associated with that by the way. The conventional wisdom is that explorers in the arctic and antarctic are at huge danger from developing scurvy due to lack of vitamin C. So they stock up on citrus fruits or, these days, vitamin c pills. But the interesting fact is that if you eat an all-meat diet, without any supplementation, you will never develop scurvy. Stefansson proved it by not only pointing to the anthropological data of the Inuit, but also by submitting himself and a colleague to a year-long experiment overseen by the Journal of the American Medical Association. And yes, you are correct, many experts of the day predicted that both men would become sick within a very short time period and would certainly be harmed significantly. Yet they went an entire year just fine--and it was a real experiment, they were accompanied at all times by paid scientific observers who made sure they weren't cheating somehow.
The funny thing is that some arctic explorers still use the all-meat diet in lieu of bringing vitamin C supplments. They do just fine. To this day no one's really sure exactly why it avoids scurvy, but it does.
What used to offend me, but now just amuses me, is that when you tell some people these things, they turn purple with rage, spittle spewing and name-calling and issuing dire warnings about what a great threat you and your pernicious ideas are.
Uhm, blood sugar isn't toxic by the way. It is the primary fuel source your body runs on, and at least some of your body's tissues need it, although not as much as some believe. Most of your body's tissues, including most of your major muscle groups and most of your organs (including substantial portions of your brain) will run just fine on ketones. But glucose is a requirement for some things. However, once you're running primarily on ketones, protein can be catabolized to provide the small amount of glucose required. The other big myth of the low-carb paranoids being that gluconeogenesis (the process of converting protein to glucose) will cannibalize your muscle tissue, but this only happens if you're not eating enough protein, which is damned hard to do on a low-carb diet. In truth, ketosis is a state in which your body is attempting to conserve muscle tissue. But don't tell that to some people, they'll treat you like a lunatic or a danger to society.
That's the one. It's a little slow-going at first, and the high-def hand held camera gives an experience totally unlike film, but I highly recommend it. There is a scene where two guys square off over a woman that is way intense.
Personally, I think that the low-carb craze is just that. My own experience tells me that avoiding calories in general, and not calories in any particular form, are the secret to success, and for me that has meant an increase in carbohydrate intake as a percentage of my diet.
But I'm not a scientist or a doctor, and I respect Dean's testimony as at least as strong as mine. Moreover, I was a co-worker for a while of Dean's, and have been amazed at the pictures I've seen lately. It's hard to argue with results.
So which of us is right? I doubt either of us is. The truth is likely to be somewhere in between.
But people like Atkins, and Duesberg, and Dembski (and Lomborg, and even non-scientists like Den Beste, when they bring facts and logic to the table) absolutely need to be allowed to speak, and have their theories and data propagated far and wide, even if they're wrong. That's science. Ending careers, rumor-mongering, lawsuits, and public humiliation are not science, no matter the practices of so-called scientists.
Just ask Semmelweis, or better, ask one of the dead mothers his research could have saved.
The low-carb craze has simmered down and has simply become a respectable alternate choice. The fact is that too much peer-reviewed research has now been published showing that it is (a) not dangerous, and (b) very helpful to many people.
It is not a panacea, but the truth is that obesity is a rising problem and if we have multiple avenues of attack then more people will find help.
The benefit of the low-carb approach is that it has been shown to clearly reduce hunger pangs. On the other hand, it increases cravings in some people (they may seem like the same thing but once you've clearly experienced the difference you realize it's a big one). Some people who try them feel like crap. Some feel wonderful.
The point is, however, this is no longer my own radical idea, or Atkins'. It's been vindicated with actual double-blind study and peer-reviewed research--which is why med students are no longer taught that it's a raging recipe for death, which is what they were still being told up to 10 years ago.
Is greed measurable? What about lust, envy, desire? The problem with social "sciences" is that psychological, behavioral and socialogical phenomena only infrequently lend themselves to enumeration, measurement and comparison.
I went toward Atkins lite on my own. Just because I could tell I felt better, more clear-headed, more energetic, more resilient, and on a longer term basis stronger while eating a lot more protein.
Probably need to do more Atkins, and less Atkins lite.
I do think that their is no one single answer for diet. Some people Atkins is not right for, and so on.
Ideally, in the future, everyone has their individualized diet as well as their individualized exercise program.
"Another interesting example from the book was a man in the 1930s who volunteered to eat nothing but caribou meat for a year, as explorers had claimed Eskimos did. The doctors monitoring him thought he would die in months. He not only survived, he actually lost weight an appeared generally healthier."
Sounds like Dave Barry's explanation of why the Indians were healthy. After a few thousand years of just bison, they mostly just picked at their food.
Social scientists have either invented or popularized lots of cool math techniques in the past 50 or so years ... I can think of a bunch of examples Chomsky's Syntactic Structures, from 1957, Eugene Fama, James Hamilton, etc.
I haven't found the killer book or books that would introduce the gentle reader to a wide range of such techniques though. You always want to be up on the latest terms to win intellectual pissing contests:
"Apparently you didn't consider lagged cross-sectional correlation".
You know, psychotherapists need to develop stuff like this. They're close with cognitive behavioral therapy but they haves a long way to go.
The burgeoning field of "Neuroeconomics" is causing a lot of smart people from the physical and social sciences to collaborate, so I am optimistic.
I do have two quibbles here, however. First, two equate the Uncertainty Principle with "arbitrariness and subjectivity" seems all wrong to me. I believe the Uncertainty Principle is neither arbitrary nor subjective, but rather defines a fundamental limit to what is knowable in the universe.
And second, I think it's important to point out that they use a very specific definition of corruption: "such as the misuse of public
power for private benefit, for example bribing
of public officials, kickbacks in public
procurement, or embezzlement of public
funds." Just as you point out how the Democratic Peace Theory is only demonstrable if you first understand their definition of "democracy", so too is it important to understand this definition of "corruption" before you can understand this study. For instance, some people might easily argue that it is a form of corruption to pass laws that favor a particular voting bloc at the expense of the populace as a whole, merely to gain political support. In other words, "pork" might fit many people's definition of corruption. And if you use that definition, it may be that you'll reach almost the opposite conclusion from this study: dictators do just enough pork to keep the people from starting a revolution, while democracies are rife with pork.
I think that definitions are part of what complicate any social science question, since so many of their topics of study have precise meanings to the scientists, but a wide range of varied meanings in general use. So people think they understand what the scientists are talking about, when they really don't.
I've been doing a version the low-carb thing for several years now (my first and last meals of the day hav no or very low carbs). Protein Power is probably the best book on the subject. It recounts the history of the low-carb diet, which believe it or not goes all the way back to an 18th century British pamphleteer's "Letter on Corpulence."
Another interesting example from the book was a man in the 1930s who volunteered to eat nothing but caribou meat for a year, as explorers had claimed Eskimos did. The doctors monitoring him thought he would die in months. He not only survived, he actually lost weight an appeared generally healthier.
The basic premise is simple: blood sugar is toxic. The insulin your body must produce to control it is also bad for you.
The explorer you're speaking of is Vilhjalmur Stefansson, a Harvard anthropologist who was born in Iceland and who spent many years in the arctic, where he discovered that the inuit typically went about nine months of the year eating nothing but meat and fish. He also found that he was perfectly healthy on their diet.
There's a very interesting fact associated with that by the way. The conventional wisdom is that explorers in the arctic and antarctic are at huge danger from developing scurvy due to lack of vitamin C. So they stock up on citrus fruits or, these days, vitamin c pills. But the interesting fact is that if you eat an all-meat diet, without any supplementation, you will never develop scurvy. Stefansson proved it by not only pointing to the anthropological data of the Inuit, but also by submitting himself and a colleague to a year-long experiment overseen by the Journal of the American Medical Association. And yes, you are correct, many experts of the day predicted that both men would become sick within a very short time period and would certainly be harmed significantly. Yet they went an entire year just fine--and it was a real experiment, they were accompanied at all times by paid scientific observers who made sure they weren't cheating somehow.
The funny thing is that some arctic explorers still use the all-meat diet in lieu of bringing vitamin C supplments. They do just fine. To this day no one's really sure exactly why it avoids scurvy, but it does.
What used to offend me, but now just amuses me, is that when you tell some people these things, they turn purple with rage, spittle spewing and name-calling and issuing dire warnings about what a great threat you and your pernicious ideas are.
But I'm not a scientist or a doctor, and I respect Dean's testimony as at least as strong as mine. Moreover, I was a co-worker for a while of Dean's, and have been amazed at the pictures I've seen lately. It's hard to argue with results.
So which of us is right? I doubt either of us is. The truth is likely to be somewhere in between.
But people like Atkins, and Duesberg, and Dembski (and Lomborg, and even non-scientists like Den Beste, when they bring facts and logic to the table) absolutely need to be allowed to speak, and have their theories and data propagated far and wide, even if they're wrong. That's science. Ending careers, rumor-mongering, lawsuits, and public humiliation are not science, no matter the practices of so-called scientists.
Just ask Semmelweis, or better, ask one of the dead mothers his research could have saved.
It is not a panacea, but the truth is that obesity is a rising problem and if we have multiple avenues of attack then more people will find help.
The benefit of the low-carb approach is that it has been shown to clearly reduce hunger pangs. On the other hand, it increases cravings in some people (they may seem like the same thing but once you've clearly experienced the difference you realize it's a big one). Some people who try them feel like crap. Some feel wonderful.
The point is, however, this is no longer my own radical idea, or Atkins'. It's been vindicated with actual double-blind study and peer-reviewed research--which is why med students are no longer taught that it's a raging recipe for death, which is what they were still being told up to 10 years ago.
"Science", indeed.
Arnold Harris
Mount Horeb WI
Probably need to do more Atkins, and less Atkins lite.
I do think that their is no one single answer for diet. Some people Atkins is not right for, and so on.
Ideally, in the future, everyone has their individualized diet as well as their individualized exercise program.
Sounds like Dave Barry's explanation of why the Indians were healthy. After a few thousand years of just bison, they mostly just picked at their food.